Bipolar

It is condign more and more evident that dual-diagnosis is crucial for many individuals battling drug addiction. At that place is a pregnant correlation between addiction and mental disease.

This is the case with most mental illnesses, just perhaps none more so than with bipolar disorder. Studies have indicated that as many as lx% of people suffering from bipolar have abused substances.

In other words, if you suffer from bipolar, there is a significant chance y'all will boxing addiction at some signal. There is no clear evidence of a neurological link between the two, just there are a lot of coexisting reasons why someone suffering from bipolar disorder might go addicted to drugs.

Let'south take a brief wait to sympathise what exactly bipolar disorder is, before discussing its co-occurrence with drug addiction and how handling centers arroyo both.

What Is Bipolar Disorder?

Formerly known every bit manic-depression, bipolar disorder is a mental affliction that affects an individual's moods. Someone with bipolar disorder will go through alternate phases of depression and mania. Reverse to many misconceptions, people afflicted don't more often than not cycle through different moods, merely rather spend prolonged periods of time suffering from 1 or the other.

Depression presents in bipolar disorder as it does on its own. The individual has difficulty feeling pleasure, lacks motivation, and feels intense sadness. They may consider suicide or, in the worst case scenario, have their own life.

Mania, on the other manus, presents as a kind of euphoria. The private feels immense confidence and ecstasy. They experience invincible and act impulsively. They have trouble falling comatose, equally they feel "wired" constantly. They may begin to have delusions of grandeur and meet patterns or connections that practise not be.

While mania may feel good for a while, it is no less an affliction than low, and tin pb many towards terrible decisions that ruin their own lives and those of others.

Considering some of the symptoms of bipolar disorder, it is not too difficult to run into its connectedness to drug addiction.

Bipolar Disorder And Addiction

Impulsivity and Invincibility

Perchance the most clear-cut reason people suffering from bipolar disorder get addicted to drugs is that they feel invincible and act impulsively. In a normal state, they may never have considered using certain drugs, but at the top of the wave of mania, they may struggle to see why not. They experience confident that they will not become addicts, or that habit could never harm them. They as well struggle with impulse control, doing what feels good in the belief that they volition never stop feeling good.

Hyperactivity

On the other manus, people suffering from mania struggle to "plough off." The highs can feel amazing for a while, but it becomes difficult to autumn asleep, at-home downwardly, and focus. They may be getting things done, but even ecstasy can eventually start to injure. Many bipolar people start using sleeping pills or tranquilizers to effort and deal with this problem. These pills tin be addictive even when taken responsibly. When taken every bit a quick-fix, by someone already struggling with impulse command, addiction is all-also-common.

Chasing The High

In many ways, mania resembles the high of sure drugs. Ecstasy or MDMA produces a euphoria like that of mania. Cocaine gives people confidence and drive. When someone is in the midst of a manic episode, they may utilise drugs in fright that the high will end. When the loftier somewhen does come up to an terminate, they may utilize drugs to try and reclaim that feeling.

Depression

During a depressive episode, the person suffering may be willing to exercise anything to feel good once again. Fifty-fifty if they did not have memories of mania to cling to, the pain of depression is bad enough to drive many people to use substances. This is not necessarily because they are unaware of the risk of addiction or overdose, but because life does not seem endurable without them. After all, a illness that has caused millions of people to commit suicide is very powerful indeed. Those suffering may be trying to chase the loftier of mania, simply in all likelihood they would settle for but feeling okay. Drugs are very attractive when cypher else is working.

Substance-Induced Bipolar Disorder

It is besides often claimed that that, on the flip side, drug utilize tin can lead to bipolar disorder. Information technology is non e'er easy to determine which came offset, but there is significant evidence that drug use – including apply of marijuana – sometimes induces bipolar disorder or schizophrenia.

The Effects Of Drug Abuse On Bipolar Disorder

Many individuals with bipolar disorder start using drugs in a witting or unconscious attempt to regulate their emotions. Unfortunately, the reality is that drug abuse but worsens the symptoms of bipolar disorder. Episodes become more than intense and last longer. There is increased take chances of suicide. And it becomes more difficult to finer treat either illness.

Treating Co-Occurring Disorders

When someone is suffering from both bipolar disorder and drug habit, it is not possible to care for merely one of the problems. Without treating the bipolar disorder, cessation of drug use is bound to be temporary. If you only treat the bipolar disorder, however, drug employ will lead to renewed emotional instability.

Addiction experts take found that treating co-occurring disorders in parallel is often ineffective. Rather, both disorders should be treated together, by the same squad of professionals. This way, a holistic handling plan can be designed, that will not be undermined by ane disorder or the other.

The individual will take a much easier time keeping runway of their own progress, in both areas. They will non have to decide whether one is more important than the other. The treatments will seamlessly intersect, leading to a more than complete recovery.

Bipolar disorder often leads to substance abuse, and substance corruption can induce bipolar disorder in some individuals. Treating them together is important, if the person is to have a complete, lasting recovery.